Page:The Geologist, volume 5.djvu/147

Rh We are anxious to remove the supposition that there is anything like absurdity in the physiological argument, however there may be in the geological deductions of our author. The facts recounted by him are only those which a pains-taking observer would collect, and the work is (for a Frenchman's) singularly devoid of any imaginative flights.

Hasty Biologists condemn the theories of M. Pouchet, without giving due weight to his arguments. Such writers will never range in the list of advocates of spontaneous generation, amongst whom M. Pouchet triumphantly quotes "Anaxagoras, Leucippus, Democritus, Epicurus, Aristotle, Pliny, Lucretius, Diodorus Siculus, Kircher, Rondelet, Aldrovandus, Matthioli, Fabri, Bonanni, Burnet, Gassendi, Morison, Dillen, Buffon, Guéneau de Montbéliard, Needham, Priestley, Ingenhousz, Gleichen, Stenon, Baker, Wrisberg, Fay, Werner, O. P. Müller, Braum, Rudolphi, Bremser, Goeze, Nees von Esenbeck, Eschricht, Unger, Allen Thomson, De Lamétherie, Cabanis, Lavoisier, Lamarck, Saint-Amans, Turpin Desmoulins, Latreille, Bory St. Vincent, Dumas, Dugès, Eudes-Deslongchamps, Gros, Tiedemann, Treviranus, Bauer, J. Müller, Burdach, Carus, Oken, Valentin, Dujardin, and A. Richard."

Pouchet remarks that the antagonists of spontaneous generation have always treated its partisans with a severity with which a just cause is never defended; they have often represented the theories of spontaneous generation as the mere fruits of insanity; nevertheless, the illustrious names who avow their belief in it merit a greater respect, and the opinions of men who have so much honoured science should be carefully examined before they receive so disdainful a reprobation (p. 5).

Chevreul has remarked that truth for all right-minded men, what- ever their position in life, is the most precious of all objects: for sooner or later it will triumph over error. Descartes wished to examine all scientific theories, even the most unlikely and the most false, "to the end," he said, "that he should know their just value and guard against being deceived." The same favour M. Pouchet implores; and he demands, as a right, that his work shall not be judged until after it has been read and considered. Professor Owen has told us, "If it be ever permitted to man to penetrate the mystery which enshrouds the origin of organic force in the wide-spread mud-beds of fresh and salt waters, it will be, most probably, by experiment and observation on the atoms which manifest the simplest conditions of life. . . . Whether an independent, free-moving, and assimilating